


Shade

by farfetched



Category: Hades (Video Game 2018)
Genre: Angst, Canon Compliant, Emotional Hurt, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-02-13
Updated: 2021-02-13
Packaged: 2021-03-14 00:34:12
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,098
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/29410566
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/farfetched/pseuds/farfetched
Summary: Disturbed by Zagreus' conduct after his most recent escape attempt, Thanatos attempts to find him; hidden in Elysium, there is a man reeling in hurt from a recent discovery. Thanatos is powerless to ease that pain.(Thanatos finds Zagreus after his first successful escape attempt. What if that first encounter had gone differently?)
Relationships: Thanatos/Zagreus (Hades Video Game)
Comments: 5
Kudos: 73





	Shade

It is a simple matter to follow Zagreus—in Elysium, at the very least—even had he not had an awareness of souls about him; the trail of scorched footprints are etched deep into the moss, trailing over and about. Thanatos follows the trail marked by the hanging weapons of the fallen and their blood, oft still drying in the pleasant wind. The battlefields are silent around him as he goes onwards, following those footprints and the odour of despair from them. He fought here, yes, not with the relished fervour of escape, but with the lack of knowing of anything else, wishing to escape the mind and so doing what has become so very automated. 

It's unsettling. 

He trails on, past the dormant traps and trenches of Elysium, the only sound the flow of the river Lanthe, the whispering of oblivion in which to forget. The thought sparks fear, and he speeds up.  
Zagreus had not spoken to anyone, on his way through the House. He'd not even spared an eye to Cerberus, usually his source of comfort when in a bad mood. The dog's meagre whine upon his passage alerted him to the unusuality of it; Zagreus' face glimpsed as he passed into his chambers and straight out into Tartarus once more frightened him more than he cared to admit. 

He's almost at that loud lout Theseus' arena when the footsteps trail to a stop, a growing patch of dead moss, singed in uncertainty, presumably looking towards the arena. Charon watches him intently, as mysterious as ever; Thanatos nods cordially. Charon acts of his own accord to the whims of no one else, and though not inclined to speech, possesses a sharp mind. Thanatos knows little of what goes within that mind, and thus does not ask Charon if he had seen Zagreus

Usually though, Charon grumbles his low, incomprehensible groan, and gestures behind him, where Thanatos notices the footsteps lead next. Just as the fear grows regarding the inability to erase the effects of the river and the difficulty in removing someone from it, he notices someone hidden behind a pillar, and pauses to hide his visceral relief.

Charon makes a creaking type of noise and gathers his wares, moving off. Thanatos wishes he was not so grateful for the action, and instead merely floats closer. Aegis lies dormant behind Zagreus, that terrible face sated in its bloodlust for the time being. Zagreus himself sits upon the edge of the land, legs dangling into the river, a puff of steam emanating from them, the clouds dissipating as they brush up against the heat of his feet. Likely only because Thanatos does not walk in any traditional sense, he is afforded the ability to get surprisingly proximate; Zagreus' face is unerringly blank, invoking a cold dagger to enter Thanatos' senses. 

Zagreus is never _blank_. 

Angry, upset, moody, yes. Happy, on a rare occasion, although Thanatos has questioned that many a time in recent days. Playful, teasing, ‘sassy’, even, he believes Hypnos once described it. 

Blank? Never. 

"Zagreus," Thanatos states, at a loss for expressing this concern that boils within him. It is as though Zagreus has lit a tempestuous set of emotions within him ever since he discovered that he'd made that first attempt at escape, and his burning anger, and dare he admit hurt? 

Zagreus jolts, twisting, with one hand going for the shield with no hesitance. The face of Aegis alights once more, eyeing Thanatos toothily—such a disturbing artefact. Thanatos has not taken the time to question from where Zagreus has procured such legendary and dangerous weapons, seething within his own emotions too much to dwell on any logistics of Zagreus' escapes. 

Upon recognising Thanatos, his face stiffens, a glimpse of fear over that face before it settles once more to dullness. Much as he resents himself for thinking so, Thanatos prefers the fear, merely since it denotes something. Fear, he understands. It is the blank ones that he can never know what to do with. 

Zagreus removes his hand from over the shield, backing down. Aegis settles, taking one last searching look at the god of death before becoming quiescent once more. He and Aegis are not well acquainted, being as his takings are rather more gentle than those in front of that shield, so stained with blood; only its questionable sentience prevents the stench of blood from sticking to it. 

Zagreus does not greet him, though. He turns around once more, facing away towards the river. 

"I thought you were busy." 

Thanatos suppresses a shudder, something quite unknown to him. Quite why such a flat tone ought to distress him so greatly eludes him, as has the reason for these multitudes of emotions of recent. Yet it does; perhaps it is purely that it is so uncharacteristic—Zagreus has never failed to greet him; he will always try and find time and attempt to make amends. Such a dismissal is unheard of, and unsettles Thanatos to his very core in a way that is uncomfortably novel to him. 

“I had business in this realm,” he returns; how is he supposed to ask what concerns Zagreus? It’s never been a question for his asking. Zagreus has always been blunt and plain about his state of being, complaining about the food, laughing about teasing Megaera or grinning about an amusing walk with Cerberus. It is only now that Thanatos considers that all these things were surface level occupations—perhaps only a cover for the pooling discomfort and unease below, the act of the unbothered concealing misery.

Zagreus barks a bitter laugh, one that feels as though it may physically cut him to pieces, such is the venom behind it. Such a painful sound, Thanatos cannot bear it.

“And what brings you here? What business could you possibly have with a _shade_?” Zagreus spits; the river Lanthe below his feet sputters with the heat, released alongside his outburst. Thanatos misses the intent behind the comment, at first. There are no shades in this corner of Elysium currently, only a few further back. Perhaps wary of the Prince of the Underworld, they yield to him and stay back.

“What are you talking about,” Thanatos retorts. He has little business with peaceful shades, this is true, especially the ones having met his blade the once. That his business has been assumed so casually irks him, although the true reason for his visit is not one he would declare, in any case.

Zagreus casts him a hateful look; little better than the blank look of before, yet cast in his direction, unfathomably.  
“You _knew_ , you had to. But why bother telling Zagreus anything? Make him fight and bleed and grasp it himself before any information is given to him. Make him die for it, repeatedly, just for answers to questions he was never even allowed to ask. Don’t act surprised with me!”

Thanatos subconsciously backs away with the venomous tirade. Fear? But how can he be fearful, of someone who has never raised arms in his direction, and even now may only wield hatred? Thanatos is used to fear, used to begging and hatred and petrification at his mere countenance. But only ever directed at him from the living, whom hold no power above his. He has never found himself in a position to fear gods, so why does this incandescent rage of Zagreus’ fill him with such terror? Why, primarily, is it aimed at him at this time?

What business could he have with a shade? He had asked that, rhetorically, steeped in a deep fresh wound, smarting such that lashing out to cause similar pain among the rest feels the only action. He’s observed this behaviour in mortals, at their deaths; so scared and hateful they seek to cause pain, perhaps believing it will relieve their own.

What business would bring Thanatos here, to this corner of Elysium, but fear for a state of Zagreus’ that Thanatos has never observed prior?

“You are no shade,” Thanatos remarks uncertainly; it is true that he has little to do with shades, especially those which have made themselves no bother to him. Many lurk in the house, after all, and Thanatos believes he’s heard Zagreus speaking to a few, the name of which escapes him. But Zagreus has shape and form entirely unlike that of a shade. He has a reality that shades lack.

Zagreus laughs. But it is no merry sound; harsh and bitter, like before, such a grating, unpleasant noise that Thanatos moves back once more. He has not known anyone able to affect him such as this, and he’s bewildered at the reaction. Zagreus is no shade—this is plain to see for any denizen of the House of Hades, the enemies he has fought, every shade that he has met. His power surpasses that of mere shades, beings stripped of their mortality.

He leans back, making his hands into fists in the moss, glaring into the sky.  
“You’d like me to believe that, wouldn’t you? I’m not that stupid.”

Thanatos pauses, stunned by the implication of it. Zagreus, a shade? It’s not possible. He lives and breathes and survives here in a way wholly unlike a shade. Has the fighting gone to his head? Is he perhaps close to another death, another trip down the Styx to rest his bruised head? Thanatos will not send him that way, though; despite his anger swelling over, there is a fragility about Zagreus that Thanatos is loath to press too much, fearful that a shattering may irrevocably change this, them.

Once again, he is struck that it is a thought he ought not have.

“You are the son of Hades; sons of Gods will never be shades, Zagreus.” Zagreus slides his eyes over to Thanatos, dulling rapidly before Thanatos’ very sight.

“Then why can I not survive in the Upper world? No gods are bound to the Underworld such that death seeks them ceaselessly upon their escape from it.” Zagreus states, oblivious to the way his words feel as though they knock air from Thanatos in much the same way he has done for countless mortals. There feels a gap in his chest, a gaping chasm into which he feels he might fall, gasping for air.

Zagreus escaped. Zagreus made it out, doing the impossible.

It is the fear and hurt made truth, given birth and made real. Zagreus took steps outside the Underworld, and it was the question they all thought and never dared ask: what if? What if he should escape? What happens then? _Do we lose him to the Upperworld?_ The unknown, of wondering whether, should he make it, he would ever be seen in the Underworld again—the question that has been troubling Thanatos since the first news of his attempts.

_And yet he is still here_.

Not via any will of his own, it appears. The River Styx seeks his passage from Above?

“That surely cannot-” Thanatos starts, as he is well acquainted with shades, all shapes and forms of them, and he is certain that Zagreus is not among them in kind.  
“If you’re going to continue lying to me,” Zagreus interrupts, returning his gaze to the river, his tone icy cold. “Please leave.”

Lying? What should Thanatos have to lie to him about? Thanatos knows nothing of lying, or he had not until Zagreus began his escape and forced Thanatos to confront parts of himself he had not known to exist.

“I care not for lying, Zagreus,” he states haughtily, “You are the son of Hades, Prince of the Underworld; I assure you that you are no mere shade. I would not acquaint myself so closely with a mere shade.”

Zagreus does not answer him immediately. He places his face in his hands and curls over; Thanatos thinks for a moment that he is about to cast himself into the river Lanthe, until he forms his hands into fists again. In a flash he’s stood, the Shield of Aegis on his arm erupting into hateful glee, a dark look on his face.

“I’m going to see her again,” he announces, grim as he stares beyond Thanatos at the gates to the arena, quiet as of yet. “I thought you would just disappear on me like usual, but it looks like I’ll have to leave instead.”

Had he driven the hilt of Stygius straight into Thanatos’ chest, it might have hurt less, watching him admit himself into the arena without a single backwards glance.

He might have understood that pain, too.

**Author's Note:**

> Hope you liked it! I was waiting for Zagreus to think about the fact that he's dead and that Thanatos ought to have known, but it didn't happen. So this happened. Zag seemed pretty chill about the fact, you know, that he died and no one said anything, but I just felt like of everyone who might have told him things, he could have expected Than to know that he'd been dead, considering. 
> 
> I know Zag is being kind of vindicative here, but he's honestly not in a state to appease other people. Charon was perfect company; Thanatos is caring and difficult all at once. Zag wants to think that Thanatos would not lie to him, but here he's too hurt to consider that Than may not have known.


End file.
